• Please review our updated Terms and Rules here

Toshiba's history a little squewed?

B

barythrin

Veteran Member
Joined
Oct 5, 2005
Messages
6,256
Location
Texas
So I was googling around to try and remember what model of Toshiba (and pretty darn sure it was a Toshiba and can almost remember the face of the user manual) laptop was my first. Mostly out of curiosity so I searched around a bit and came to Toshiba's history site.. this was cool except .. wtf?.. what's this timeline blabbing about? They think they had the first laptop computer? .. they think they had the first color laptop? First laptop with a CDROM?!.. um.. "But our passion for innovation is hardly new. In fact, it dates back a couple centuries," ok wait a sec.

Does anyone here know if Toshiba actually had any firsts like this? I mean maybe they're calling it a Laptop on purpose instead of portable (Osborne) or first color (Commodore SX-64) but even the first laptop sounds wrong.. wasn't that a Grid clamshell computer?.

I'm a bit astonished although I can't claim to know everything but it seems like quite a stretch or can someone calm me down? lol http://laptops.toshiba.com/about/history-of-innovation#
 
Last edited:
"first laptop" if we agree "laptop" refers to our current notion of "clamshell" or "flip form factor" (flip form is the term the wikipedia article uses), although I think clamshell is closer to what GRiD patented (and made money off of licensing).

I prefer the definition of a laptop to include battery usage, otherwise it is merely portable. So I would be inclined to give the nod to one of the early Epson's (PX-4 or HX-20?) as the first laptop.
 
I've still got my Toshiba 2150CDT. It was the first laptop with a CD-ROM in the chassis, as opposed to being an external plug-in unit.

I remember seeing the DG/One shortly after its release. It was the first laptop with an 80x24 or 25 character display. It was on a table at a WESCON. I looked at it several times and wondered "why don't they turn it on?" Finally, on another pass I decided to get down on my knees next to the table and try out the keyboard, on or not. I hoped showing interest would get one of the salesdroids over to switch it on.

When I got right down in front of it, I could just barely see that there were, in fact, characters on the screen. It was on! I played with it and found that it was also set to the best contrast at that level. If you were positioned just right, you could see faint characters. At that point I went back to wanting an HP110 with its sub-sized, but high contrast,display...
 
Being an Apple nerd, I know that the PowerBook was one of the first laptops with the palm rest and centered keyboard. Certainly set the style for a lot of future laptops.
 
Thinkpads were nice also, I think the 760CD I have was one of the first multimedia models (captures external video and sound with built in mpeg).
 
Toshiba's was the first that I know of with a 286 chip, but .... so what? Lots of perfectly good chips existed before that. In other words, Toshiba is full of shit.

Regarding the Grid Compass 1100/1101, I think if you ask 100 people, 99 would say a laptop isn't a laptop if it requires tethered power.

As for whether a laptop MUST be a clamshell design, that's open for debate. There are two ways of looking at it:

1. In the early 1980s, non-clamshell laptops were most often called "briefcase computers" (guess who those were marketed toward?) and later just "lap computers" -- the term "laptop" wasn't printed anywhere until 1984, at least not that I can find. If anyone can point me to an earlier reference, not merely assumption/claim/speculation, then I'd like to see it.

2. In academic history circles, there's the concept of "Whiggism" which means, "The mistake of applying modern conditions to historic events." Thus, it's incorrect to define a 1982 laptop-like computer by the standards of 2009 laptops. (For example, consider "desktop" vs. "PC". Lots of desktops existed between 1977-1980, and most had their guts integrated with the keyboard assembly. Then in 1981 IBM began selling the desktop itself separate from the keyboard, and it's more-or-less been that way ever since then. Does that mean all the desktop microcomputers from 1977-1980 aren't "real" desktops just because of their form factor? Of course not. So again, MUST a laptop be a clamshell? I say no.)

Still, if we DO use the modern-for-old approach, then the first battery-powered, clamshell portable is ..... none of the computers mentioned above.

I know what * I * think is the first "real" laptop but I'm keeping that to myself until my book is published! ;)
 
Last edited:
Chuck(G) said:
I don't consider either the Sharp PC-5000 or the Gavilan to be a "modern" laptop. The screens are too small (less than 25 lines).
Click to expand...

So, it's only a "modern" laptop if it has a 17-inch widescreen?

Put another way .... of course it's not "modern" .... these are vintage computers we're discussing. :rolleyes:
 
EvanK said:
So, it's only a "modern" laptop if it has a 17-inch widescreen?

Put another way .... of course it's not "modern" .... these are vintage computers we're discussing.
Click to expand...

We're talking about the term "laptop" as it's now interpreted. The Grid Compass was disqualified because it needed AC power (although I believe there was an external battery option for it).

So, "clamshell" got tacked on as qualifying something to be a laptop. So that let's out the HX-20s and Model 100s and Visual Commuters.

And I'm saying that a "laptop" also should include a full-sized (i.e. something capable of displaying at least an MDA/CGA's screen worth of text) screen, which neither the Gavilan nor the PC 5000 has, but every laptop made in the last 20 years has.

As far as I'm aware, the DG/One was the first machine to meet all of those requirements. It has everything that one would recognize as being a laptop today.
 
Chuck(G) said:
I'm saying that a "laptop" also should include a full-sized (i.e. something capable of displaying at least an MDA/CGA's screen worth of text) screen ... everything that one would recognize as being a laptop today.
Click to expand...

Screen size is merely a technical specification, not a major feature. A small screen is related to a DG/One screen just as a DG/One screen is related to a 2009 MacBook screen. Who are you/I/anyone to draw the line at an arbitrary specification number?

Anyway, "first" is interesting trivia, but what's important are the "who/what/why/how" aspects of "early".
 
Bah! Who needs spell cheek anyway?! Yeah ;-) I noticed right as I clicked submit that for some reason Firefox didn't check the title text for errors for whatever reason (guess it was doing something else and not paying attention).

So to throw a little more gas on the fire, Evan's post disagreed with clam shell being a requirement if you're trying to guess his answer prior to publication.

I definitely agree though, modern technology shouldn't be applied to a term in vintage technology. Otherwise you'd be seeking a device with a cd-rom (arguably not vintage), integrated mouse, etc. I'd agree I wouldn't be satisfied with a portable terminal or calculator as the answer though.

I thought (and I'll admit I'm ignorant of a lot of computer history as being too young to understand/own it at the time other than common publications I read) the first laptop/notebook would have been the hx-20 due to it's portable nature, built-in screen, and battery power.

I do agree with Chuck though, I would like to see/know the first pc-compatible laptop (runs standard software without modification, portable power supply and usable on a bus or on the go.)
 
EvanK said:
Screen size is merely a technical specification, not a major feature. A small screen is related to a DG/One screen just as a DG/One screen is related to a 2009 MacBook screen. Who are you/I/anyone to draw the line at an arbitrary specification number?
Click to expand...

I propose a simple Turing-esque test. Take an 8 year old kid and show them a Gavilan and ask what they see. Then take a DG/One and repeat the experiment. Lather, rinse, repeat until you get a good samplng.

My prediction is that a far greater number of children will identify the DG/One as a "laptop".

Technically, a TRS-80 Mod 100 or an Epson HX-20 is also a "laptop". My Smith-Corona PWP7000LT even qualifies as a "clamshell laptop", although I doubt that anyone would identify it as such (It's got batteries, a floppy drive and a fold-up LCD display as well as a serial port. The CPU is an 8051, but it can even run a spreadsheet or transfer files with Xmodem).

My point was not about screen size per se, but that it was "full size"; i.e. it showed the same number of characters or pixels that the CGA display of the same time would have done. The Gavilan and Sharp were "peephole" sized displays. Fire up a copy of Microsoft Word or Lotus 1-2-3 and see how useful it is on that type of display.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top